


Acquiesce

by 2trangerMcDanger



Series: pitch solkat [3]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Incredibly self indulgent, M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Quadrant Confusion, Quadrant Vacillation, WOW so pale, if you wanted smut or anything like that, sorry - Freeform, vvveeerrrYYYY fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-13
Updated: 2019-11-13
Packaged: 2021-01-30 07:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21424513
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/2trangerMcDanger/pseuds/2trangerMcDanger
Summary: You haven’t been a huge fan of his one-sided game of musical quadrants that you’re just kind of participating in (because it’s nice sometimes, but you won’t say it, ever) but in this moment, you like it. You like being pulled out of hating him for just a second to feel safe and calm. You’ve always liked his hand on or around you, a warm reminder of your physical being and that soft twinkle of feeling good in your own skin.xxxDraft 1
Relationships: Sollux Captor/Feferi Peixes(mentioned/alluded to), Sollux Captor/Karkat Vantas
Series: pitch solkat [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1531658
Comments: 3
Kudos: 34





	Acquiesce

At some point, surgically connecting computers in weird ways stopped being entertaining. Especially considering how little you know about this specific type of machinery, something you’ve tried talking to Karkat about but he has no idea what you mean.

“Yeah, I get it _looks_ different, but it operates the exact same way, doesn’t it?”  
“No, it absolutely doesn’t. Don’t you remember biological implants in the computers back at home? There’s nothing like that in these, it’s like a weird combination of some alien technology and—”  
“Bold of you to assume I opened up the computers back at home, scraggly-dick.”

  
“God, of course, you didn’t why would I ever expect you to have some intellectual curiosity. All you know is unga bunga tappie tappie shit fart make letter and scream.” You closely inspect a piece of a motherboard, gently touching the small bumps. You recognize most of this, but there’s something _missing. _Something _else_ is supposed to go here, but it doesn’t and it throws you off every time. You probably shouldn’t be talking, especially when talking is in the form of bickering with your pitchmate when you’re being timed on this.

“By intellectual curiosity, did you mean ruining my very expensive property and then having to force you to fix it? Or did you mean ruining my property and then buying a new one just so you don’t have the satisfaction of knowing I failed? Because in both instances I end up the loser. And by the way, watching you play around with little pieces doesn’t look or sound very adventurous.” You glance up at KK to see him sitting criss-cross with his palm husk lying limply in the palm of his hand, the timer still going and reaching dangerously close to the ten-minute mark. You forget to respond cleverly to him in favor of quickly assembling even faster than you were trying to before.

This goes there, and that goes there, here and here, pop and click and, “Done.” You say, triumphantly and look up at KK with an optimistic expression as he stops the timer and frowns at it. “10 minutes 32 seconds.” He says with a face that says “sorry buddy” without saying it.

You groan loud and angry, throwing a screwdriver across your block and hearing it clatter against the hard floor. “God fucking _DAMMIT!!_” you scream, hands scratching up your hair.

You’ve made it your goal at this point to learn these computers better than the ones you're comfortable with, and the first step in that is opening them up and becoming intimately familiar with it’s inner workings and organs. Last week it took an hour to put all the pieces together (while they were already arranged on the floor for you like Satan’s 3D puzzle.) Five days ago, it took 45 minutes, Three days ago it took 20. And here you are in the present, where it takes you 10 and a half minutes and you’ve stagnated and it _kills_ you. This is the 12th time you’ve got 10 and give or take ten seconds.

You would be more impressed with yourself if this wasn’t the only thing you were doing. But it is, so you should be _better_ at it by now.

Karkat takes no time in whipping out his freakishly huge boner for Not Knowing What A Quadrant Is and puts his hand real gentle on your shoulder. You look up at him while taking your hands away and you can feel the tangible hate welling up in your head as he looks at you with those _sad, sympathetic_ eyes. It pisses you off more that he’s not saying anything, because you know what he _would _say.

He’d say _Don’t worry, Sollux, try again next time, you’ll get it next time._

And you’d say _No I WON’T get it next time, I’ll get the same thing next time, and the time after that and after that because I’m terrible engineer, and terrible at computers. I fucking hate computers, why did I choose this as my hobby, why did I choose this as my passion to pursue, of all the things to dabble in as a hobby or enjoyment, I couldn’t have been a baker, or a dancer or a painter or anything else, no I had to be a fucking COMPUTER NERD._ And then you’d throw your computer across the room or something, and Karkat would get mad because _oh wah wah I’m bitchgrub Karkat and computers are expensive_ and you’d probably cry while yelling at him back and then deny crying when you calmed down because you never cry and he’d say he’s sorry and you’d say _no I’m sorry, you didn’t do anything wrong_. And maybe you’d hug it out and try again.

But he doesn’t say that. So, none of that happens. Instead, you’re waiting for him to say something to piss you off, and instead, his hand gently cups your cheek, an unbelievably blatant pap, and your shoulders drop a little, relaxing.

He’s never officially papped you before, yeah, he’s waxed pale pretty clearly and showed it, but he never acted on it so obviously. You’ve never officially been papped before either. Aradia used to shoosh you and rub your back or pet your hair, but it was never a _pap_.

It makes you melt a little, and sigh as you shift your face into his palm, your cold teeth accidentally poking his much too warm skin and you half-assedly kiss his palm. Your eyes flutter closed as you deeply inhale and exhale. He still doesn’t say anything, you don’t either.

You haven’t been a huge fan of his one-sided game of musical quadrants that you’re just kind of participating in (because it’s nice sometimes, but you won’t say it, ever) but in this moment, you like it. You like being pulled out of hating him for just a second to feel safe and calm. You’ve always liked his hand on or around you, a warm reminder of your physical being and that soft twinkle of feeling good in your own skin.

KK holds you there for a few more minutes and you finally pull away when you’re calm. “You need to go slow before you can go fast. Let’s try again, but this time, don’t rush. Take your time.” If he’d said this _before_ your almost-freakout, you would’ve argued and freaked out. But now you’re calm, and you could use the feeling of no pressure or restrictions; just you and your craft.

When you do it slower, it’s mostly muscle memory, but you have the time to take small notes in your head. This piece _looks_ like a different piece, but it doesn’t fit, and that always messed you up, now you can take a really good look at it and see the differences between the two. There are lots of pieces like that, you noticed, and you take the time to look at each one.

This time, Karkat doesn’t look so bored, and your conversation is more entertaining as it serves as lighthearted background noise.

“I’ve noticed you’re hanging out with Feferi a lot lately. You guys friends now?”  
“Yeah, I guess. She’s nice and fun and all. Even if she does make some weird comments. I know that’s just from what she was raised in.”  
“Do you mean water or royalty?” KK jokes.  
“Both.”

He laughs and it makes you a little giddy inside. “I think she might like you.” He says, flashing you a forced smile that wouldn’t be obvious if you didn’t know him so well. “Maybe you’re right.” You glance up at him as an awkward silence falls over the two of you. “Is that gonna be an issue?” You don’t _mean_ to sound rude when you ask, you made an effort not to, but it still kind of came across that way.

He seems to flinch a little at your question. Are you finally going to get to talk about how much of a weirdo he is? It starts to seem like you aren’t when he says “uh…No, not necessarily.” You stop building and stare at him slumping your shoulders, “Dude, c’mon. I know about your clusterfuck with TZ, you had a reddish-black thing for her, and then she started red flirting with the human guy and yo--”

“You don’t know anything about that!”  
“Like you didn’t do it in front of everyone?? All the time?? And am I not currently in that situation or are we strictly one type of relationship.” You ask rhetorically in a bit of a snarky, playful tone, and he shuts up, pursing his lip and glancing away while rubbing the back of his neck. He looks embarrassed, and maybe you’re still riding that pale-high from earlier, but you can’t help but think he looks kind of adorable. 

“Look, I’m not judging you. I’m just saying…how can I make you _not_ flip your shit as much as possible? And I don’t mean flipping like—”  
“I know what you mean.”  
“Surprising.” You joke, and he’s too far away to hit you, so he kicks your computer and you squeal. KK has to, what looks like, physically restrain himself from laughing tremendously at you, but manages.

“I mean, this entire situation is completely hypothetically, nothing between FF and I is set in stone.”  
“Sollux you already have a stupid nickname for her,” he says this with a scowl, and you’ll admit you turned a little warm at that observation.  
“Yeah, but it doesn’t _mean_ anything.”  
“Whatever, it’s your quadrant, you can do whatever you want with it.” He doesn’t seem satisfied with that response; in fact, he looks more uncomfortable than when you started this conversation.

“KK,” you start, sounding annoyed and a tad defeated, “what do you want me to say. What do you want me to do? I don’t want the thing that happened with you and TZ to happen to us. If you want, I could tell her—”

“No, don’t tell her anything! God! No one else needs to know I’m a possessive, jealous feral _disease-creature_.”  
“If it’s any consolation, I think everyone already has an inkling—okay I can already tell that was a bad joke, sorry on my part.” You still laugh a little and you can see a little smile on him tug up.

He does the thing where he fidgets and rubs at his neck and collarbones under his shirt and you can tell he feels really bad for all of this. “I mean…can you just—can you _try_, I should ask, try and…include me a little more? Like I’m not asking for some unholy threesome or for me to be a sad and desperate third wheel, or should I say the fourth wheel?”

  
“Not funny.” It was funny, and you laugh a little and he perks up. You toss around the idea in your head, trying to figure out what it means. Thankfully, KK is incapable of shutting up.

“I just mean, don’t…stop hanging out with me, or stop…giving me attention. Cause I think that’s what really upset me with Terezi, she spent a lot of time with Dave and it not a lot of time with me. And I get that his all sounds like Stage 5 Clinger, I know, I understand, It’s a little much to ask and I understand if you wanna spend time with your new matesprit or whatever you two end up being, I’m a big boy, I can suck it up, it’s just…” he sighs and lays his hands in front of him, palms up. You lean over your computer and put your hands in his. You’re not used to being or thinking about him in this tender way.

“No, I get it. I understand. It’s okay, we’re not even a thing, you don’t have to worry about this shit right now.” He looks at you like he doesn’t believe you, and maybe he shouldn’t. Honestly, you’re not sure if you’re ready for anything officially in either of those quadrants. You’re still kind of a mess after Aradia, and you’re pretty sure her coming back isn’t a possibility, she died before the game, so it’s not like she could be revived, right? You’re not entirely sure how revival works. But it was neat of Feferi to revive _you_, you suppose. Your feelings are complicated now. And you wouldn’t wanna be in a relationship with someone that you don’t really like, but you’re thinking of just giving it a shot, who knows, maybe it’ll be great, maybe you’ll date for a week and her fish puns will stop being cute and start being agitating, or the way she touches you so much will start bothering you, who’s to say? Who’s to say you won’t be together for sweeps and sweeps? Until she outlives you of course, but whatever, right?

But you digress. Again.

A blanket of comfortable silence with a little patch of awkward silence stitched in cover you two again until you finish building. “Are you in the mood to try again?” He says, looking a little sad, and fuck, how are you gonna get a new matesprit if he’s constantly shoving your head in this vat of flushed bullshit against your will?

“Eh, maybe I need a break. Why don’t we do something you wanna do.”

That seems to cheer him up.

It turns out, what he wants to do is hold you with your back to his chest, his hands on your stomach, chin on your head and talk about the humans. It’s the dullest conversation you could imagine, but you agree like it sounds like a good plan, and go with it. He tells you all about how weird their romance is, what they say their food looks like, their funny words for things, _seriously, what kind of word is squirrel??_ He touches your bare stomach to tell you about the hole (a literal _hole_) in their body that does nothing but exists, and wow, you never knew someone could have such a heated opinion about alien music.

Maybe it’s because you’re so bored, you couldn’t help it, or maybe you’re exhausted from staying up and doing literally nothing but taking apart and putting computers back together, but you pass out in his arms, a warm cocoon that almost dares to you think it feels like sopor and not the diluted fake shit you have to make due with since _someone_ keeps eating all your actual sopor. Or maybe you fall asleep because the way he’s rambling reminds you of your bees back home and it feels too nice not to take the opportunity.

Regardless, he’s not mad when you wake up. He’s asleep too, still behind you, like he’s barely moved. You can tell it’s him by the way he’s making your entire back all sweaty. Not that anyone else would be here, clutching you like this. All you think as you start forming thoughts in your head is _god, what a freak._


End file.
